The Nintendo Wii U trumps the Wii in sales revenue

Nintendo’s Wii U console has surpassed its older brethren in sales. In just under two months since its release, the Wii U has raked in about US$300-million in sales, compared to the US$270-million the Wii garnered on its release. In December the Kyoto based consumer electronics company sold more than 2.65-million hardware units in total.

The Nintendo DS (53-million units sold to date) still manages to sell well after all these years, with almost half a million sales over the Christmas season, while the 3DS managed to muster 1.25-million units for a total of 7.7-million units world-wide. The original Wii console managed a figure of about 475 000 units sold, and now has an all-time sales figure of approximately 40.8-million.

As Scott Moffitt, executive vice president of sales and marketing for Nintendo America said: “While the Wii launch established new benchmarks in the United States, Wii U has surpassed its predecessor in perhaps the most important category: revenue generation. The demand for the Deluxe SKU, which was essentially sold out at retail this holiday, and the strong attach rate of New Super Mario Bros. U, shows that we have the value and the games to drive momentum in 2013.”

New Super Mario Bros. U sold more than 580 000 copies for the same period. This comes after some early wobbles in sales, with Nintendo President Satoru Iwata saying that “at the end of the Christmas season, it wasn’t as though stores in the U.S. had no Wii U left in stock, as it was when Wii was first sold in that popular boom. But sales are not bad, and I feel it’s selling steadily.”